Ballplayers Want Access In Poinciana

March 30, 2005|By Cristina EliAs, Sentinel Staff Writer

POINCIANA --With yells of "We want practice!" and "Go, team, go!" a group of parents and more than 150 children who make up a youth baseball league in Poinciana surrounded the Association of Poinciana Villages last week in the latest chapter of a heated war over practice space.

"We want more park time," said Julyries Perez, an 11-year-old player who showed up with her parents to protest alongside many of her teammates waving signs in Spanish and English.

Parents of the children who play in the recently incorporated T & T Future Baseball Stars League complained they are not getting equal access to the athletic facilities in the community.

According to the parents, who are mostly Hispanic, the association is giving the choice times and facilities to an older league, Poinciana Little League, while T & T is offered softball and soccer fields for practice.

Parents, though, say those fields are not viable options.

"How are we going to bring our kids to practice before 5:30?" asked parent Maria Algarin about the 5:30-7:30 p.m. Monday-through-Thursday schedule of the other league. "Most of us don't get out of work before 4 p.m."

The parents complain that one field is unsafe because its lights were damaged during the hurricanes last year. The association says it has taken more than three months to fix them because of insurance disputes.

As for the soccer fields, they too are off-limits now that soccer season has started.

"For us, it's discrimination," said coach Mario Colon of a T & T team. "They haven't given us any logical explanation why we can't share. We have more kids."

T & T has 485 kids between 3 and 17 years old, while Poinciana Little League, which has been there for 11 years, has at least 160, according to APV.

The association says it has given the parents everything they've asked for -- starting with a schedule to play Fridays and Saturdays assigned in July 2004 and confirmed at the beginning of this season.

"If they thought they were going to have that many kids, they should have thought about that earlier," said Val Ramos, assistant manager of the association, emphasizing that there are no plans to change the schedule mid-season.

"We're not going to hurt one team to help another," he said. "Besides, Poinciana Little League was here first."